How to Wander New York City Without Looking Like a Tourist

wikiHow is a “wiki,” similar to Wikipedia, which means that many of our articles are co-written by multiple authors. To create this article, 11 people, some anonymous, worked to edit and improve it over time. This article has also been viewed 5,615 times.
Learn more...

This is an article about wandering the Big Apple without looking like a dysfunctional fool.

Find a friend in the city. If you know someone there, you will more than likely be able to crash with them for a week or two, which is enough time to let you get to know both the neighborhood in which they live and your prospective next neighborhood. If they're nice, they'll provide you a place room-and-board free, but be careful, there may be other prices (work for them in exchange for stay, sleep in small quarters, you get the picture). If they are good friends they'll do all of these things cost-free.

Can you please put wikiHow on the whitelist for your ad blocker? wikiHow relies on ad money to give you our free how-to guides. Learn how.

Read up on best locales for eating, walking, and tourism. Do all the things you'd do, or at least plan to do all the things you'd do, if you were a tourist in the city as well as the things you'd do as a local. Finding great reviews is easy, just gravitate towards the people who you think would give you worthy advice on sites like yelp.com, nytimes.com, or independent reviews.

Wander. Nothing beats wandering for getting the feel for the city; a place like New York is very diverse, and you'll get your fair share of cross-cultural immersion if you're in a place like Chinatown or Spanish Harlem--but those are only a few of the places offering multi-cultural eats, scenes, and businesses. Explore.Take steps, make moves, and explore.

Try to contribute to the household you're in. That means doing things like the dishes, sweeping, walking the dog, and helping even when you don't see a direct benefit to yourself. Or, if you have it, leaving chunks of cash around. You never know how far an act of kindness, especially in the limited square footage of NYC, can go in keeping roommate relations civil, fluid, and productive. So much of the process is an act of symbiosis; you give while I take, you rest while I work; we both work and contribute. It's a beautiful thing, so don't let it go sour.

Don't be afraid to speak your mind to your rooming buddy (or buddies). Speak out if you need fewer parties, want to go hang out, need more of your own friends over, etc. It's better to let it out then keep it in.

Accept the possibility of potentially having to let go. Move into a new place; hopefully by step 7 you've adjusted well-enough and quickly enough to know the kinds of neighborhoods you'd enjoy living in or around, and try to indicate to your roommate, family, and friends nearby, who might be able to have your back, where you'll be staying. You may need them to cosign for you in your first place.

Look for no fee apartments. Be wary of people trying to scam you into putting first and last months rent down, especially if you have no ownership rights to the place. If you do eventually get to own, then watch out, it's loan time.

Community Q&A

Tips

Be weird sometimes. You will get a lot of attention if you walk home with a giant bag of pineapples as opposed Manhattan portage messenger bag. If you can combine the two...even better. Idiosyncrasies are charming.

Avoid making eye contact with New Yorkers. New Yorkers are just people like you but the culture is somewhat different in the bustling city. Try to avoid making eye contact with people unless you intend to start a conversation. Eye contact often indicates that you have a question or need help and that may not be the sentiment to communicate to every Joe on the street.

About This Article

wikiHow is a “wiki,” similar to Wikipedia, which means that many of our articles are co-written by multiple authors. To create this article, 11 people, some anonymous, worked to edit and improve it over time. This article has also been viewed 5,615 times.